


No Plan

by elisabethmariec



Category: Castle Rock (TV), Hemlock Grove, IT (2017), IT - Stephen King, The Stand - Stephen King
Genre: 70s, Angst, BDSM, Blood Drinking, Blood Kink, Blood Play, Body Horror, Breeding, Crossover, Daddy Kink, Disabled Character, F/F, F/M, Gothic, Horror, M/M, Occult, Pining, Polyamory, Pregnancy, Smut, Southern Gothic, Suspense, autistic main character, bisexual serial killers that really fuckign love each other, everyone in this fic is so gotdam queer, gay angst, hand holding, kinda vampires kinda immortal demigods whos to say, so much fucking worldbuilding man
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-23
Updated: 2019-09-27
Packaged: 2020-03-13 05:52:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18934759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elisabethmariec/pseuds/elisabethmariec
Summary: A husband-and-wife duo of nomadic serial killers in servitude of an eldritch cosmic being are side-winded by a series of unplanned events.





	1. Chapter 1

**“Why would you make out of words a cage for your own bird? When it sings so sweet the screaming, heaving, fuckery of the world?”**

The Kid’s head tilted back, face turned towards the heavens, fingers curled at the temples in a mock crown of thorns. With a lusty sigh, he faced the congregation and ran his fingers over his trimmed beard. He smiled, thin and welcoming. His voice was dulcet and clean, a soft Texas drawl emanating from his vowels: “How _blessed_ we are today, folks. How blessed we are, to congregate, to consecrate, on such a fine holy day. And that is, in fact, what we are doing. In every moment here, every moment you spend in the house of God, you are consecrating the ground under your feet. You are blessing yourself. Making yourself more and more holy with each passing second.” Another thin smile. He chuckled. “I hope y’all are familiar with the Beatitudes. Matthew five if you haven’t memorized them yet. I’d like to go through those today with y’all.” The echo of his voice fizzled out, replaced with the turning of thin Bible papers. “Now,—

_“Hey, hey, pull over.” He tapped her shoulder several times. She pulled the teal pickup truck onto the shoulder, and before it was fully in park, he was scrambling out, doubling over, tossing his coffee, grits, and over-easy eggs up into the grass._

_“Aw, honey,” she cooed, looking out through the open car door. “Are you okay?”_

_He stood upright, wiped his lips with the back of his hand, and opened his mouth to speak—_

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” He paused, staring out into the intent, listening faces of the chapel. “Now, poverty in spirit. Poverty in financial affairs isn’t somethin’ most of us are too fond of, is it?” He chuckled with the crowd. “No, I suppose not. Spiritual poverty- well, a man who is poor in spirit is happy. They are lowly and humble in their own eyes. They thirst for cleansing and for—

_“I suppose this is repentance for my humanly sin.”_

_“Our god believes in sin?”_

_“Does It believe in mankind?” He exhaled, stared out over the rolling hills and winding oak trees. The sky was screaming blue, not a cloud in sight._

_She checked her watch. “Two hours. We’re still over an hour from Schulenburg. Are we gonna have en-”_

_“More than enough. More than enough.” He glanced around, saw no signs of people in sight. A clear space amidst a smattering of trees looked promising. “We’ve got a few minutes to waste, mama. Do you want to—”_

a redeemer. A man who is poor in spirit is a man who we should all aspire to be.” He prattled on for as long as he could, letting his mouth run on autopilot. Whatever bible-beating bullshit he could come up with to keep the crowd pleased. Semi-important phrases repeated several times for emphasis. Long, dragging pauses to force conscious thought. He almost dropped the accent once, but caught himself before anyone noticed. He couldn’t find it in him to even make himself pretend that he enjoyed it. This wasn’t his religion, much less his type of crowd, but he had to. This was work. He let his thoughts drift back to—

_She quickly hiked her panties up, fixed her dress, and brushed the dirt off her hands and knees; he zipped up his fly, tucked his shirt back in, raked his hair with his fingers. The truck sat parked on the shoulder with its doors ajar. The radio was set to a country station, blaring a song neither of them recognized. Her hips swayed in time with the crackling music and she turned to face him, grinning._

_“Esther…” He crossed his arms._

_“Randall…” She crossed her arms in response. “Come on, papi. We got time.”_

_He rolled his smiling eyes. “Fine.”_

_He wrapped his arms around her waist and pressed her against his chest. She stepped the toes of her cowboy boots onto the steel ones of his work shoes, and rested her chin on his shoulder. In the slow, swaying dance of their bodies, the earth seemed to take pause. He felt her wandering hands run up his back, then down again to squeeze his ass. Something deep in his heart tugged, loosened up as a gentle reminder set in: she was the one. She’d fallen into the cogs of his inner machine and chipped at the rusted-over parts, slicked up the parts she needed to, got him working again. He’d pulled her into his grasp and she flew with open arms. And she would be the only one to do so; It had prophesized to him as such. The rest were mindless, lowly sentinels, pawns to be checked off their board._

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.” He repeated the verse again, slower for dramatic effect. The crowd—a lily-white, red-necked conglomerate of gingham and bonnets—shifted in their pews, feeling the silence that settled over the chapel, thick enough to cut with a knife and serve on a plate. He had to admit, this was his favorite part.

“Now, folks, I hope y’all are all pure in heart.”

_“Aww, baby, why’re you crying?” Esther cooed, wiping his cheek with her thumb._

_He hadn’t felt the tears rolling down his cheeks, nor heard himself sniffling. “Oh, I’m sorry, honey. You know how I get now, with—”_

The pressure of the mounting, uneasy silence was near-orgasmic to him. He had to fight the urge to shudder as his skin broke out in goosebumps, blood rushing between his legs.

_She nodded, rubbed a placating hand up and down his side. “We should get going.”_

 “I hope y’all said your prayers this morning.”

_“Hey.” He cupped her face in his hands and kissed long and slow. “I love you.”_

A sigh fell from his parted lips, and his hips twitched. It was coming.

_“I love you too.”_

His voice was accent-less and gravelly with lust. “And I hope you said something nice to your loved ones before you left.”

With a moan, the shockwave hit full force from the east side of the chapel. The wood paneling buckled in half and burst, sending shrapnel into unsuspecting eyes and ears. Church-goers were tossed about like rag dolls. He watched gleefully as a burly man in a bolo tie and a mint button-up went flying, landing heart-first into a cut-off telephone pole and effectively turning him into a human kabob. There were no screams, no cries of terror. Within six seconds, the church went from standing to flattened. Randall prayed a silent gratitude to his god, thanking him for the blissful protection It provided in every shockwave. The silence was different. Barren, spacey. Something behind him crackled and fell. He stuck his hands in his pockets and sighed at the desolate church around him. Bodies were strewn about, twitching, bloodied, all dead.

Looking out onto the aftermath, he smiled to himself. You’ve outdone yourself this time, kid _,_ he thought. A sense of pride overwhelmed him after every mission, although the routine and the results remained the same: drift into a tiny church town with no significance on the map, preach the word of God, raise hell, rinse and repeat. Despite no town living long enough to spread news of Randall Flagg (The Walkin’ Dude, The Kid, The Fucking Devil, whatever banal, baseless nickname a gaggle of stoned teenagers could throw at him from across the street), he never used the same name twice in any state. The waitress that had served him and his wife breakfast before the sun had come up, the young expectant couple he held the door open for on their way out, and the Sunday morning church-goers he communed with before the service started would know them eternally as Mr. and Mrs. Henry Deaver. On their last mission, he was William Sutton, and on the one before that, he was Thomas Gardner. He did what he could to look different from place to place, as well: he could grow a beard for one town, trim it down for the next, go clean-shaven for a couple more; he wore glasses every other state or so; he could gain and lose weight easily- in some states, he was bone-thin and in others he’d get remarks about being well-fed. Esther had told him once he was like a chameleon, the way his appearance changed and shifted to blend in with the others. He could see the truck from where he stood. She would be curled up the best she could across the seats, sleeping. Poor thing never got enough rest, he thought.

“Hey.” He grinned, tapped on the window.

She jumped awake, stretched out her arms, and opened the driver’s door, scooting close enough to lean her head on his shoulder. He chuckled and let his hand rest on her thigh where he squeezed gently, and she took his hand in hers, absentmindedly playing with his fingertips.  As he turned off the shoulder and sped back onto the highway, she witnessed the desolation left by the shockwave. Houses, mailboxes, chicken-wire fences laid flat as if they’d been run over by a bulldozer. She caught a glimpse of the body of a dog smushed against the trunk of a leafless blackened tree, half of a couch in mid-air falling into the decrepit roof of the neighboring residence, uprooted gardens, overturned cars. Lost souls praying to a false god, finally getting to meet their true maker. Part of a day’s work. She yawned, stared out the window. “Well, from what I can see, you did pretty good, baby.”

“Thank you.” He sensed the shift in the car. She was about to ask where they were going for lunch. “I’m sorry, sweet girl. There’s about six hours before the next stop.”

“But, Randy, we always…” Her brow furrowed, and her lips threatened to pout. She stared into the space in front of his chest for a long moment, thinking. She had found routines in the midst of their ever-changing scenery, and clung to them with fervor: a cleansing, then out to eat, then back on the road; her cases of knives were to be kept in a box in the left corner of the bed of the pickup, moved in and unpacked last; she picked out his shirt every morning, always showered before him, always ordered the same pancakes and scrambled eggs and OJ at whatever diner they ate at that day. Routine was a necessity for her, and change threw her off-balance. He knew that she could cope, though. His eyes were focused on the road, but he could feel her fidgeting with his fingers, stroking up and down his skin, smoothing down the hair on the back of his hand, tapping a rhythmless beat on his knuckles, and letting go when he needed to suddenly change lanes. She sighed and flapped the tension out through her hands. “Where are we off to next?”

He patted her thigh. “There’s a town about forty miles south of Fort Stockton that It wants us to stay in until August. It’s got a house waiting for us, and there’s enough space for us to have our own rooms this time. You’ll get to have your own place to put up your knives this time, honey.”

Esther nodded, smiled, subconsciously wriggled her hips in excitement. Her knives were special to her, sixteen assorted blades sorted and divided between two leather-bound cases, and one gold, hinged penknife she kept in her right boot. Some of them had stories, like the engraved Damascus folding knife her abuela gave her for Christmas when she was a little girl; some of them were for carving, like a steel paring knife she always kept surgically sharp; and some of them she simply found pretty. She could spend hours sharpening their blades and polishing their handles, organizing and re-organizing them, sharing every discovery and fact about them to Randall (who always listened intently), and she was grateful to have a space to display them once more. Their last mission, some two hours outside of Baton Rouge, cramped them into a one-bedroom apartment with no a/c and no room for her to display her knives or go to during a meltdown. She was on a hair trigger then, somewhere halfway between shutting down or bubbling over; everything from a nick on her finger or Randy sounding upset in her direction could pull forth a meltdown. She was exhausted and asleep more often than not, and the rest of her time was spent trying to find an excuse to leave the apartment. It wasn’t all bad, though. The bed was comfortable, quiet when it needed to be.

She certainly missed being able to make love in a bed and have a hot shower afterwards. In fact, she wasn’t certain of the last instance they’d had enough time to really make love, not just a quickie in the car or up against a tree on the side of an empty highway. It had to have been six weeks, maybe longer. If her math was right, and the $3 pregnancy test she took in the dingy bathroom of a dingier truck stop wasn’t lying, it was true: She was pregnant. With child. The phrase carried a weight with it that she felt the urge to slough off of her skin. _With child_ was for petite white women with cutely rounded bellies, living in their picket-fence mortgage traps and sipping on chilled lemonade while their white collar husbands worked their nine-to-fives and only yelled at them once or twice a week. _Pregnant_ was a mistake, a silver, squalling fetus borne from a dark womb onto a bloodied mattress, a coat hanger and a flight of stairs and an empty bottle of pills. Pregnant wasn’t what she wanted to be, nor with child. They spent nine months out of the year on the road, and three in shady, crime-laced suburbs, lurking in bars and sweet-talking future sacrificial victims home. It was out of the picture for her to throw a baby into the mix. But the long-ingrained societal itch to domesticate still lingered under her skin, and she knew Randy felt it, too. He had asked her once, their long limbs tangled up together in their smoky post-orgasm haze, if she wanted a baby.

“I could make some arrangements, we could settle down somewhere nice, sprout a little one or two.” He smiled, ran his large hand over her chubby belly. “Like real people do.”

She giggled between kisses to his neck. “I’d like to start calling you _papi_ for a reason.” She planted her lips firmly on his jaw, suckling until she heard him moan. A moment of thoughtful silence, and she spoke again. “If the two of us can barely fit our legs in that truck, where am I gonna go when my belly gets all big?”

“Your belly’s already big,” he teased, patting just above her navel.

She squirmed, swatting away his hand with a squeal. “Watch it, bug.”

The conversation floated away into more love, then sleep, and had never been returned to since. She knew her husband like the back of her hand, and she was certain he would stay with her and figure something out. He had never raised a voice or a hand at her, and he loved her beyond the ends of the earth, but the intrusive devil in the far corner of her mind wanted to convince her he’d leave her alone in Nowhere, Texas with nothing but a knife in her boot and a baby in her belly. The thought alone sent a warm chill across her back, and she felt the urge to vomit climb up her throat.

“You okay, sweet girl?” Randall’s voice shook her back into reality. He’d taken her hand in his, swiping his thumb back and forth across her skin. The car was still moving, she was still breathing.

Tears welled up her vision. She felt like a pressure cooker, her hands beginning to flap away the tension in her chest. The words tumbled out of her mouth before she could stop them: “I’m pregnant.”

Wordlessly, he found an exit and pulled over onto the shoulder, and once the car was still he turned to face her. Her fingers tapped ceaselessly against her legs for several minutes before he spoke. “You’re sure?”

“I missed my period, and I took a test last night.”

He ran his fingers over his mouth and tried to bite back his grin. “Do you want to keep it?” When she broke up with hiccupping, shuddering sobs, he pulled her in close without hesitation. “Oh, sweet girl, it’s okay,” he cooed softly against her ear, rubbing his hand up and down her spine. “Esther, I promise I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do. It’s okay.”

She took what felt like an hour before she spoke softly into his neck, “You won’t leave me, will you? If I get rid of it?”

She felt his breath swallow up in his chest. He gripped her shoulders, brought her gaze to his, slowly shook his head no. His words were whispered and thick, and she watched the tears mist over his vision. “Of course not, dove. I’m with you ‘til eternity ends. You know how much I love you.” He kissed the tip of her nose, both of her cheeks, the cleft of her chin. “It’s your call, mama. Regardless of what you decide to do, I’ll stay with you through it. Okay?”

Esther nodded, whispered okay and let her fingers continue to tap against her leg.

“We need to get back on the road, birdie. You gonna be alright?”

She nodded yes once more, he put the car in drive, navigated his way back onto I-10, and she tuned _pregnant_ down to silence in her mind’s radio. The car was different once, but now the same, she felt. A snapshot of a teal Ford pickup truck with several cardboard boxes in the bed covered by a tarp taken three times in its original condition, the first before _pregnant_ , the second in the midst of _pregnant_ , and they sat in the third. The snapshots would linger in the fuzziest part of her brain for the rest of the day, and she’d turn them over occasionally, reading the date on the back or studying the way the truck looked. In a pretentiously poetic way, the storm clouds that had once hovered over the truck as it sped down the interstate away from the flattened church had thinned back into a cheery Sunday blue. The storm was gone; she could sigh, turn her back to the window, prop her legs up in Randy’s lap, and sleep for the next six hours.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> new threats dawn on the horizon as randall and esther come to terms with their purposes in the order.

An excerpt from the bi-annual advisory meeting of The Order of the Crimson Pearl, transcribed by Walter Randall Flagg. Present are Esther Paola Flagg, Walter Randall Flagg, David Arthur Barrows, Howard Richard Nolan, Sonya Mallory Patton, Kathy Elizabeth Underwood, and Aleister Henry Kane. The advisory meeting was held in the Flagg residence on 1372 North Prospect Dr., Castle Rock, Maine, on February 13th, 1972, approx. 7pm EST:

Esther: “Patton and I have calculated that pardoning the educational ward of sector 5A of the Maine camp, and merging it with the ward on sector 3C would allow it to be accommodated, but the fact—”

Barrows: “Esther, 3C has six classes of twenty-five each.”

Esther: “Yes, and there are seven school-age children in 5A. They will manage.” (Underwood hides a grin, but is noticed by the transcriber. Barrows shifts in his seat.) “If I can continue, the fact is the Maine camp has an infant mortality rate of five point seven percent, four percent higher than the New York, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts camps, second only to a five point nine percent rate in West Virginia. According to Mr. Nolan’s reports, two-thirds of infant deaths were stillborn, and the remaining third from lack of medical care during pregnancy or labor, resulting in the loss of the infant before twelve months.”

Barrows: “And what of the demographics? Of the gross negligence?”

(Esther glances towards Nolan. Nolan flips through a manila folder and produces several sheets of loose-leaf paper.)

Nolan: “Ah. Forty-five percent of Latino origin. Thirty-five percent, ah, African-American. Fifteen percent Caucasian. Five percent unknown. All female, of course.”

Patton: “Oh, God.”

Esther: “Do we have the names and sectors of the doctors that treated these women?” (Nolan nods and hands Esther several sheets of paper. While Esther reads over the papers, Patton leaves the dining room table to pour herself another cup of coffee.) “Most of these cases are coming from 2C—”

Kane: “Not surprising.”

(The transcriber notices that the look Esther gives Kane is cold enough to make Hell freeze over.) Esther: “Most of these cases are coming from 2C, but were treated by doctors in your sector, Aleister, 5A. Of course. What’s disturbing to me is that all one hundred and fifty-six cases occurred between January of 1970 and September of seventy-one. Five months have passed since the last incident, and I haven’t been informed of any until today. Why?”

Randall: “We have held four advisory meetings between then and now, and not a single one of you thought the deaths of one hundred and fifty-six infants was important enough to be added to the itinerary? Have we forgotten what the atonement for dishonesty is in the texts of Qan?” (The room is silent. Kane lights a cigarette.)

Esther: “If I’m going to arrange the budget to accommodate a second medical unit on 5A, I can’t have an advisory panel withholding information from me. I have no issue having all of you replaced, but I’d rather not. Is there anything else I need to know about?” (The room remains silent. Esther sighs.) “Fine. Meeting adjourned. Um. Go home, get some rest. Treat your partner well tomorrow… Randall.” (The panel chuckles. Shuffles and light chatter are heard as everyone stands to leave.) “Sonya, would you and Helen stay for dinner tonight? I was hoping we could go over—” Tape recording ends.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Sleep had refused to come to Esther. It teased in dizzy, lethargic glimpses, but never fully encompassed. She chose instead to turn the radio on and stare out the window, humming along with the slower songs, watching the golden-lilac sunset fade into inky night. The drive was long, as were all of their drives. She didn’t mind; She could keep busy. She stole glances of her husband, his wide eyes lost in thought, his large hands on the steering wheel, the upturned tip of his nose. Randall was having a vision, she could tell. One of those daydreams that creeps over the sides of your head and draws the curtains of conscious thought closed. There was a glassy quality to his eyes, and his lips moved in silent conversation. Still aware enough to remain on the road but sucked down into the briny blue darkness, catatonic, pelagic. She wouldn’t be able to rouse him if she tried. He would come around when he was ready.

She turned her focus back to the scenery beyond the window. Texas sunsets were awful pretty, almost as pretty as the ones she saw on the front porch at home, in Maine. _Home,_ she scoffed. Wasn’t a _home_ so much as a place to stop in between missions. Meetings could be held and parties could be thrown, but the house retained a degree of unfamiliarity that she didn’t like. That house, so large and unapologetically American, dripping with rich mahogany and gilded wallpaper, containing her wedding dress, his book collection, all their photo albums, the personal belongings too fragile to bring on the road— never felt like _home_ to her. Home was in smaller spaces, in the smell of freshly ground spice and the sizzling of cold eggs on a hot skillet, in motel rooms and their old beat-up truck and in… in her Randy.

“Randy?” She placed a hand on his shoulder. His breath had become harsh and deep; the vein in his forehead bulged, and there was a shake to his hands.

“’m gonna pull over.” He spoke so low she wouldn’t have heard him if she wasn’t looking at him. “Get out. Have a smoke.” He inhaled sharply through his teeth. “Oh, fuck me…”

“What is it?”

He nodded towards the right-hand side of the road. A gas station was quickly approaching. “You go call Sonya; tell her we’ll be home before August. Change of plans.” He pulled into the parking lot, tripped over his shoes as he hopped out of the truck.

Esther followed. “What are you talking about? Randy, what’s going on?”

“Please, baby…” He took her hand in his, thumb running over her plain gold wedding band. There was a hopelessness to his tone, a resignation and submission that resonated hollow in her chest. “I’ll explain when we get to the house. I don’t have much time. Please.”

She nodded, and he watched her walk away.

It took several attempts to get the cigarette lit, and he nearly dropped the damn thing twice before taking a long drag, blowing smoke into the evening sky. Watching his wife in the phone booth, wide hip leaning against the glass, one hand fidgeting with her long braided hair, he felt a pang of pity in his chest. He pitied her, not for her inability—she was a perfectly capable woman—but… he could sense the electricity of a coming storm on the horizon. Things were changing, and he knew how well she coped with change.

He hadn’t _lied_ to her per se: he didn’t know the truth. He knew of the tradition—the current Seer and Leader producing the next Seer together—but he wasn’t born into The Order, and neither was Esther. Somewhere within the rankings of the cult, the truth had become ashy and mottled with rot. Neither of them were told they were required to produce a child; in fact, neither of them were told anything on the matter. It had been assumed, whether between the members of Esther’s advisory panel or their god Itself, that they knew the tradition applied to them, too. How could he argue that? What was he supposed to do- come to the panel with his tail between his legs and admit his ignorance? Fight back against Its command and get him and Esther killed? Face the atonement for willful ignorance and lose an eye or a hand?

He wasn’t growing the baby in his belly, though: it’d be up to his wife to decide.

“Hey.” She smiled. In the glow of the sunset, she looked golden, radiant.

“Come on, pretty birdie.” He wrapped an arm around her waist. “We got places to be.”

~~~~~~~~~~

An excerpt from the personal journal of Walter Randall Flagg, A-Ranking member and Seer of The Order of The Crimson Pearl, dated March 14th, 1972:

_…in the vision, I was in Maine, at home, in the living room. It was the middle of the night (as far as I could tell). I’m not sure what I was doing there but I felt tired, like I had just woken up. Upstairs, Esther was crying. She was in the bedroom, along with Sonya and her wife, Helen. Esther was heavily pregnant, on her knees, rocking back and forth. Helen told me I fainted when Esther’s water broke, which sounds about right. Sonya’s a good friend and a midwife, but I didn’t trust her in that moment. I felt possessive, as though she was trying to take something that was mine. I’m not sure if it was Esther or my daughter I felt possessive over. Something’s telling me that it’s a girl, the baby._

_I was confused. I didn’t understand why Esther was pregnant, and I said to her, “I thought we got rid of it.” That set Sonya off, who said, “No, you can’t get rid of it! You’ll die if you try.” She was manic, kept saying that over and over, and I still don’t know why. I don’t think that part was real. I don’t know how much of my visions are real until they play out in real life. But I think It was trying to tell me that she can’t get rid of the baby. Then the scene changed, and it was total darkness. I must have been in prayer, because I could hear Its voice and I was responding. It read to me a quote from the Fourth Text, the one about The Seer and the Leader producing a child together. The metamorphoses from Leader to Vessel, from Seer to Giver, vice versa, all that jazz. I remember panicking when It told me that. I said something like, “I can’t tell Esther that, she’ll kill me.” and It telling me It will kill me first. That scares me. Sure, a baby would be wonderful, but I don’t know if I’m ready. I don’t know if she’s ready. Time will tell._

_I wasn’t angry in the vision- if anything, I pitied Esther. But coming out of the vision, I was furious. I was angry with The Order, I was angry at Esther, and I was angry at myself. It’s my fault (somewhat) for the baby. But no one told me this is how it’s supposed to happen. I’ve dedicated the past decade of my life in studying Its texts, speaking to It, putting myself through hell and back for It—and It wants to kill me for not knowing? I’ve betrayed It, haven’t I?_

_If this is my last mission, so be it. I’m ready._

~~~~~~~~~~

The move was made in relative silence. Boxes unloaded and unpacked, floors swept, dinner eaten, all done without a word between them. There was no tension, no awkward pauses, just simple quiet. She settled into the corner of an old, dusty couch, and he took the loveseat as he explained the vision to her.

Esther repeated her question: “Are you sure?”

He nodded. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’m so sorry.”

“Yes, you are.” She spoke without looking up, picking at the skin around her fingernails. “You should be pretty fucking sorry.”

“Esther, come on,” he sighed. “I can work something out with It. Maybe you won’t have to… you know.”

“You can say ‘push a baby out of your vagina’, Randy.” She grinned, glanced up at him.

He chuckled, and she noticed the tips of his ears turn red. “It won’t be as bad as you think it is. Sonya’s a midwife, she’ll take good care of you. I’ll be with you, too, baby.”

“Of course.” She thought for a long moment, sighed. “I need some time to think about it. You do what you can, and… I’ll think about it.”

He reached forward and took her wrist in his hand. “Honey, this is life and death. You can’t just think about it.”

She pulled away. “I _know!_ I know.” Her lip threatened to quiver, and she let out a shaky sigh. “You don’t know what it’s like to—”

“Well, no, but I can imagine—”

 _“Randall.”_ She had willed the tears away. There was a disappointment to her gaze, a betrayal, that made him want to shrink up in on himself. She continued, “There are hundreds of people out there that depend on me, on us, for guidance. Women and children that need to be protected. And here I am—well, do I get rid of the baby for my own selfish reasons, and leave all of them without leaders? Or do I die in childbirth and leave you alone with the baby?” She laughed absurdly, disbelieving. “Do you see what I mean?”

It was Randall’s turn to speak without looking up. “What makes you think you’re going to die in childbirth?”

“I don’t know, baby, why don’t you ask my mother, or her mother, or—” A gasping sob burst through her, and she buried her face in her hands. “I’m sorry, I…”

He was by her side in an instant, arms around her shoulders, pulling her close. He spoke in between kisses to her neck. “Oh, Esther, honey. Things are different now. We’ve got more knowledge, more experience. You’re gonna be just fine, baby.” Another kiss to her shoulder, and he laced his fingers with hers, letting their hands fall on her lap.

“How long this time?” she muttered against him.

“Two weeks.” He let go of her hand to poke at her side. “Then we’re going back home so you can cook our baby in peace, hm?”

She gave a thin, quick smile. “Sure.”

He looked at her watch, double-checked with the clock on the wall above the dry bar. Quarter to midnight. He moved to stand up. “It’s almost time, birdie. Can you be ready soon?”

With a sigh, she nodded. “Time for prayer.”

“Time for prayer,” he agreed.

~~~~~~~~~~

On a chilly winter night, a week before Christmas of 1971, in a middle-upper-class suburb in Castle Rock, Maine, in a two-story slate grey American residence, Randall Flagg had locked himself in the closet. He knew why he had closed the door behind him (to keep out that fat bastard of a cat, Marshmallow, whose fluffy white paws he could see swatting under the door), but he couldn’t remember why he was in the closet… _Oh,_ he realized. He was looking for a book, some old leather-bound thing that had instructions for a sigil he needed to practice. He found himself on his knees, hunched over in the far corner of the closet, rummaging through a still packed cardboard box, neatly stacking his horror novels, her medical books, bills and reports off to the side, until—An envelope. Still sealed, never sent. A red wax seal binding it closed, bearing the sigil of The Order. The top left corner, his address. The middle, _Peter Godfrey/34 Homme Dr./Hemlock Grove, PA/17102._

He straightened up, brow furrowed, fingernail running over the corner of the envelope. He had long forgotten what was inside, but the energy remained, and it was so warm, giddy and blushing, like a schoolgirl on Valentine’s Day. But something in him went icy, shriveled up, screamed not to break the seal. _This is Pandora’s fucking box, Randy, I swear to God, don’t do it don’t do it don’t do it you’ll hate yourself for it you hear me you fucking f—_

He slid a finger under the flap of the envelope, snapping off the wax. Several sheets of paper, —not just any paper, the decorated parchment Esther wrote her letters on—covered from margin-to-margin in his thin, scrawling handwriting. Cringing, he allowed himself to read a line.

_“…but it feels so right to me. You feel it too, don’t you, Peter? There are times, often at night, often when we are apart, that I wish her hands were yours, and his hands were mine…”_

His bottom lip slid between his teeth, and he ran his tongue over the flesh. He felt dirty, dirty like putrid smoke crawling from yellow-rotten teeth. Dirty not for wanting a man—he had many friends who were homosexuals, and he himself could lean either way—but dirty for _wanting._ He had a wife, a wife whom he loved with all of his heart, whom he cherished and adored, and yet…

“Randy-baby?” Esther’s voice called to him from beyond the closet door. “You okay?”

He jumped, scrambled to put the books back in the box, set the letter on top. “Uh, yeah, I’m fine, honey!”

She cracked the door open. “Roman called. He said he and Peter and the little ones would like to have us over for New Year’s…”

He tuned her voice down in his mind. Still sat on his haunches in the back of the closet, nothing more than a wide-eyed speck floating in the vastness of time, he had never been so aware of how small he was compared to the rest of it all. There were beings out there much larger, far more powerful than him, great sandy beasts with bleeding gums and clouded eyes using galaxies as playing cards, and he was so insignificant. Coming out of the closet would put the moment behind him, he felt. Cast the sickly saccharine letter into darkness, float him back into the orbit of normalcy, of sleeping with his wife, of the dirge and drag of work… and it did. The memory of how that man once made him feel had already begun to fade as he stepped away from the box and out of the depths of that dark room.

~~~~~~~~~~

There was a rabbit in a cage in the empty garage. Randall had never been fond of rabbits, and certainly not this one. The house’s previous tenants had abandoned the animal far too long ago- it drifted in and out of consciousness in lurching gasps, its white fur matted and falling off in clumps, muzzle pink with blood. Its head darted back and forth, as if it were following an invisible fly… or perhaps fighting it off. The eyes had always bothered him. There was something so human in a rabbit’s eyes, so aware. It was as though rabbits were creatures of the divine, as though they rubbed elbows with gods and knew secrets about the dark side of the moon. _Creatures of the divine that eat their own shit,_ he thought. _Eh, what’s up, Doc?_

Esther’s lip curled at the sight. In the cold florescence of the garage, nothing looked real. She shook her head. “Poor thing.”

“Would you do the honors?” he muttered, eyes unmoving from the caged god.

“Is that the…” She nodded towards the cage.

“’s gonna have to be, isn’t it?” He noticed the look on her face. “I don’t think it has rabies, honey. I don’t think it’s left its cage in a while.”

“I hope not. I’m still wearing gloves, though.”

They began the ritual in tandem, like always. As he lit the candles, she turned the lights off; as he meticulously chalked out the sigil onto the floor, she plunged her penknife into the rabbit’s neck, putting it out of its misery in one swift motion. It let out a solemn, gurgling cry before collapsing, and she knew the feeling of the pitiful creature going cold in her hands would haunt her for days to come. While she hung and drained the rabbit over a pot, —a slow-going process, as it was so dehydrated its blood dripped out in sticky black gobs—he undressed down to nothing and sat in the middle of the complex symbol on the uncomfortably cold concrete. Time was of the essence here. He thanked himself for remembering to grind the herbs and roll them beforehand, for he could feel the changes beginning already. His toes had begun to lock up, curl inward, lose their feeling and articulation. The blinding pain spread upward through his ankles, and he took a long pull on his blunt. He could smoke as much as he could, but there would always be pain. Pain was as constant as the ticking of time, as steady as the swell of the sea: there was no stopping it. Every moment in prayer existed in pain. _Atonement,_ It would say. _Enlightenment exists only in the agony of prayer._

Esther found his prayer captivating: it was the closest to Qan anyone could get, and he was the only person on earth with the ability to do so. Nothing else existed beyond the four grey walls of the garage, and all she cared about in this moment was sitting right in front of her. She had dedicated years to studying the human anatomy, borrowing her father’s textbooks and reading them in one sitting under the covers at night. She had memorized every bone, artery, and nerve, and how they work together to make life. She retained enough knowledge to beat out any doctor in the field… and yet she could never figure out how Randall’s prayer worked. To chalk it up as simply an act of divination felt wrong to her. Sure, she was steadfast in her faith, and she trusted their god to provide and work Its miracles, but- there had to be something else, right? Something in the way his metabolism worked, or in the structure of his muscular tissue, that allowed his body to contort so violently without dying? She didn’t know yet. The itch of not knowing kept her moving forward; she _had_ to know how his insides worked, or else it’d eat her up inside.

She watched with parted lips as he turned. A sense of wondrous terror dawned in her belly as the wet cracking of broken bones rang out through the garage. His eyes rolled back in his skull and went limp on his shoulders. He was losing shape, shriveling up into a fetal position as his flesh congealed and rippled. If she looked closely enough, she could make out the last of his defining features- the outline of a jaw here, the shape of a kneecap there. A thin sheen of sweat had broken out across the pale, quivering mass of flesh, and she carefully wiped him clean with a dry washcloth. _Almost done,_ she noted. Dipping her thumb into the pot of rabbit’s blood, she traced over his skin, copying the sigil on the floor as though it were second nature. He was so cold compared to her; she’d have to move a space heater into the garage.

“See you in two weeks, baby.” She wasn’t sure if he could hear her, but she spoke aloud anyways. She tossed the carcass into a trash bag and dumped it in the backyard to rot. The blood would go rancid if left alone, so she stuck it in the fridge with a cover. She would move the mattress in the bedroom to the garage in the morning- she couldn’t sleep without Randy nearby. As she bent over to pinch out the candles, she scanned over his form, looking for any sign of response.

“I know about you and Peter,” she wanted to say aloud, but kept inside. Not yet, she decided. Not while he’s defenseless like this. The time to get it off her chest would be soon, she felt, and as she closed the garage door behind her and curled up on the couch to a dreamless sleep, she mentally played and re-played the scene yet to come.

~~~~~~~~~~~

An excerpt of an article _,_ titled “Massive Fire Prompts Schulenberg Police to Investigate”, dated March 15th, 1972. The piece was featured on the front page of the _San Antonio Sun_ along the left-hand margin below a movie review column lauding Liza Minelli’s performance in her new flick _Cabaret_ :

…and families of those attending the Dubina United Methodist Church last Sunday were devastated at the news. Investigators determined the fire to have started within the chapel and spread for 5 miles in all directions, killing 59, including newly hired pastor Rev Henry Deaver and his wife, Paula. Schulenberg Chief of Police Stuart Donaldson is quoted as saying: “It was the biggest goddamn fire anyone has ever seen in the history of Texas.” Police are looking into what may have caused it, and few theories have arose. Some speculate the explosion was electrical, but deputy Carl Watkins disagrees. “I think it was intentional,” he claims. “I’ve seen electrical fires, and they don’t act like this.”

At this time, the Schulenberg Police Station is accepting donations for the families of the victims via cash or check, and their phone number is…

Below the article, a picture subtitled “Dubina United Methodist Church, March 1972.” The church is nothing fancy—tall and picket-white, an American flag billowing proudly in the sun. On the street in front of it, a Ford pickup truck with a tarp over the bed is parked, and if one were to look closely enough, you could see the outline of Randall Flagg in the driver’s seat.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading !! i hope you enjoyed !! follow me on tumblr (elisabethwise) for aesthetics, asks, and other content relating to randall and esther !! please leave feedback, i could always use it !!


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